Flight simulator company Dogfight Boss, and Varjo, the high-end XR headset creator, announced they’ve shipped their first mixed reality F-16 simulator to the Ukrainian Air Force to help accelerate pilot training. And there’s likely more to come, as the country inevitably looks to scale training to keep pace with the influx of the American-built fighter jets.

Last month Ukraine began receiving its first F-16s from NATO members Denmark and the Netherlands, which are meant to replace its aging Soviet-era MiG and Sukhoi jets. Belgium and Norway have also signed on to provide Ukraine with over 60 of the fighter jets.

A handful of Ukrainian pilots began training to fly F-16s in Arizona late last year, however Ukrainian officials have expressed frustration they simply can’t train enough, as F-16 training programs in the US and across Europe have limited seats.

Now Dogfight Boss and Varjo have partnered to deliver a MR headset-equipped F-16 C Viper simulator to an unspecified Ukrainian Fighter Pilot Base in Kyiv, which will allow pilots to fly virtual missions while seeing a passthrough of their instrument cluster, allowing for a more realistic training experience.

Although such a platform doesn’t address the training crunch at hand, it will allow pilots to train and maintain skills in-country, which has been an active war zone since the Russian invasion began in February 2022.

Dogfight Boss maintains in a LinkedIn post that the reception to the MR simulator has been promising thus far, noting there is an “urgent need for additional units to support cooperative training scenarios.” This could see at least eight more simulators shipped to the Ukrainian military, the company says.

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“After nearly a year of detailed fine-tuning and extensive testing with the help of EU F-16 pilot instructors, we are honored to deliver Ukraine’s first fully functional F-16 simulator,” Dogfight Boss CEO and founder Lukas Homola says. “This simulator is a testament to our commitment to precision and excellence, which is being developed and produced in-house. From construction to electronics, every component, including the complete instrument panels, throttle quadrant, pedals, and force-sensing stick base, has been crafted to meet the highest standards.”

Both the Finland-based Varjo and Czechia-based Dogfight Boss have worked extensively with defense customers over the years, with Varjo’s XR headset currently used by 60 such entities, including the U.S. Army Reconfigurable Virtual Collective Trainer (RVCT) program which uses Varjo for portable training for the Apache, Chinook, and Blackhawk helicopters.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • Shad Daffucup

    bit fucking late isnt it? they're basically russian territory now, and as far as i know the russian air force doesnt have f16s.

    • Jistuce

      Oh, it is certainly a bit late, but they aren't basically russian territory yet. Large portions of Ukraine haven't even been a part of the war so far.

  • wackadoodle

    Zelensky has been told by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken & UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy that they cannot hand over another money and weapons to defeat Russia, and that he “needs to come up with a more realistic plan”

    Kiev has been told that a full Ukrainian victory would require the West to provide hundreds of billions of dollars worth of support, something neither Washington nor Europe can realistically do,” the WSJ stated

    The US & Europe have already provided Ukraine with $200 billion in assistance since Feb 2022, with the battlefield situation continuing to worsen, and an additional $110 billion aid is pending

    Reality begins to set in for NATO. What’s next? A game of passing the blame. When the day of reckoning comes as to how all of NATO lost the proxy war in Ukraine, the US and UK are covering themselves, giving into Zelensky’s endless requests, so they can’t be blamed for not going far enough in supporting Ukraine

    • ViRGiN

      Valve supports Russia.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      TL;DR: neither Ukraine financially backed by Western countries nor Russia backed by China will lose due to running out of funding, as there are secondary global power interests that go far beyond the conflict itself; the money talk is strategic for a long term conflict resolution via negotiations, as a military solution is unlikely; traditional weapons like the F16 play a minor role, as much simpler and cheaper drones allow for asymmetric attacks, causing lots of damage with very limited risks and cost, so flight simulators will be mostly used for training much more needed drone pilots.

      Things are a lot more complicated, and there is much more at stake than full territorial sovereignty of Ukraine.

      The US alone spent USD 2310bn in Afghanistan as part of an abstract war on terror, based on the Taliban not willing to act against the (Saudi financed) terror group responsible for 9/11, operating from their grounds. With not a lot more to gain than PR points. This time there is an added huge US interest to send a strong signal to China that attacks on sovereign states won't be tolerated, regardless of historical borders, as a direct military confrontation over Taiwan could cost a hundred times of what the US and partners provided for Ukraine so far.

      And after centuries of their countries regularly engaging in war with each, the EU states need to demonstrate their unshakable willingness to make significant sacrifices to stop military aggression in Europe from becoming a viable choice again. Continued support for the Ukraine that is on the European continent, but neither a member of the EU nor the NATO, makes clear that feared attacks on the former Soviet Baltic states bordering Russia like Estonia, now a member of both EU and NATO, would see a much stronger reaction. They also need to counterpoint their reaction to the Russian 2014 Crimea annexation, when financial reasons led to rather weak sanctions, which probably encouraged Russia to go after Ukraine.

      So the chances that anyone will cut off Ukraine's financial support are basically zero, as there is much more at stake, even though nobody expects that this war can be won in a classical sense. It's more about positioning the conflict parties for some kind of peace negotiations that allows both to keep their face. Talk about reducing funding serves to appease voters and push both Ukraine and Russia towards, with China pushing that way from the other side too.

      For strategic reasons Russia cannot fully give up Crimea, some of which go back to NATO massively overextending its 2011 mandate from the UN security council to protect civilians in Libya by separating the conflict parties. For the first (and so far last) time in history, permanent council members Russia and China didn't veto against an intervention in one of their partner countries, only for NATO to then topple the Gaddafi regime, leading to Russia and China again steer towards superior force to resolve conflicts instead of trusting in partnerships and negotiations. This only scratches the surface of what is involved, with Ukraine and the money spent not even the main issues.

      Western countries on the other hand cannot let Russia's Crimea annexation be a success, so a partial territory exchange will be the most likely result. Russia might keep their Crimean Black sea naval bases, but Ukraine the rights to exploit the huge gas reserves there, with all Russian territory currently taken by Ukraine returned, Ukraine regions with large Russian populations like Donbas getting a more autonomous status, Ukraine joining the EU and Russia getting security guarantees from NATO. Or some other complicated compromise.

      War is always stupid and an unfathomable waste of resources, but unfortunately there is no reliable way to stop people from doing extremely stupid things we then have to react to.There are indicators that Putin expected this to be a quick three day in-and-out excursion to Kiew to replace the government with one friendly to Russia, not trying to join the EU and providing a buffer zone to NATO, with a limited reaction from the West, and no long conflict or occupation. Pretty much everybody was surprised that this isn't what happened, and now everyone is stuck with a conflict they don't want, cannot win, but also mustn't lose.

      A lot of what is happening, incl. sending F16 to Ukraine, is more about making clear to the other side that they realistically cannot win. Despite having destroyed most of Ukraine's planes, Russia never controlled the air space due to fear of their fighters getting shot down from the ground, so there will be no dog fights. They pulled back their powerful Black sea fleet after losing several very expensive ships to Ukrainian rockets and drones, which are the weapon of choice in this conflict.

      So Czech F16 simulators using Finnish high end HMDs will have some impact, but drones that are much cheaper than planes and don't even need to come home, are controlled using remote flatscreen displays, satellite video connections and flight sticks by soldiers trained on video games that can go home daily once their shift is done. Training a drone pilot takes a fraction of the time and cost of training a fighter pilot, with basically zero risk for the pilots life other than accidentally tripping on the way to the toilet.

      I'm sure that expensive high tech plays a big role in this conflict and the ways people try to find a workable exist. But it's less about USD 63mn F16 jets and simulators for saving time and some of the over USD 5mn it takes to train a US F16 pilot. It's much more about providing intelligence from satellite image analysis to point out where to effectively hit with rather cheap technology, to convince both sides that a solution by force is neither possible nor worth it, leading to more realistic concessions in peace talks.

  • Ramonov

    We support Genereral Putin and the Russian Federation in their adventure for defence against the Russian people who are in need for support in ukraine and russia. Nato is to blame for this war. Why? Because the americans have put their troops and slaves too close to russia and need to be washed away from other slave countries who just let them in. The WW3 is already put inplace many years ago and the most of the population don't understand this and ned to be 'EDUCATED' and must understand the tricks of this trade. Please get educated lads!!

    • Jeff

      Admins, where you at? You can't post a story like this and not expect the trolls to show up.